USA Africa Dialogue Series - Academic Conferences: The big and small wahala

I've just renewed my membership to three learned associations. Year after year, I wonder why the fees are so steep. In addition to the fees, you also pay the registration fee if you intend to attend the yearly conference (for a total of $400-500 per association for someone like me). I am not going to ask what they do with all that money.

Depending on the location of the conference, you must also pay for your plane ticket, ground transportation, hotel and dining, and the miscellaneous costs. If your institution is funding you or if you have funds from other sources, then, no wahala. Otherwise, you must be ready to cough out, say, $1500-2000 a year for a conference within the USA.  Going overseas? Well, that's baba nla wahala from Montgomery, Alabama.

These associations are very important, and so is attending/presenting at conferences. But what do you do if your institution does not have the funds, you are unable to secure external funding, or are not financially buoyant? Chai, that na mountainous wahala.

I was in Argentina in December 2019, and in North Georgia in February 2020. But because of the impersonal nature of online conferences, I have not attended or presented since. If the pandemic allows, I will be back on the road beginning summer 2022.

As an aside: Covid-19 will be with us for a very long time. Loss of human lives or not, human suffering or not, the reality is that some forty percent of the total global population will refuse to be vaccinated. But sha, wear your mask; wash your hands; and social distance. But above all else: get the third shot…get boosted. Happy New Year!

Sabella

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